Tag Archives: Emergency landing

Ryanair, the World’s Most Hated Airline, have fired the Pilot who appeared on the Channel 4 Dispatches documentary that probed safety culture at the airline.

Captain John Goss was dismissed with immediate effect and Ryanair said they plan to pursue legal action against him after he questioned the airline’s safety.

“We will not allow a Ryanair employee to defame our safety on national television,” the airline said in an e-mailed statement.

Pilots are wary of raising concerns and are encouraged to carry as little fuel as possible, the Channel 4 “Dispatches” program reported, citing a survey conducted by the Ryanair Pilots Group, which claims to represent more than half of the carrier’s pilots. The fuel issue arose when three jets declared emergencies before touching down in Valencia, Spain, after diversions from Madrid last year.

Goss was one of five pilots elected to the pilots’ group interim council in June. During his 26 years at Ryanair he acted as a flight safety officer and his record was “blemish free,” the RPG said in an e-mailed statement.

“The immediate reaction of Ryanair to safety issues brought to their attention is to deny the existence of any problems and to effectively shoot the messenger,” RPG Chairman Evert van Zwol said in the statement. “Safety experts are agreed that a sound safety culture is based on pilots having faith in a non-punitive approach and dealing directly and transparently with all concerns raised.”

In a strongly worded report, Spanish safety investigators said that “market competition” was forcing airlines to carry less emergency fuel to improve competitiveness.

And they warned that air traffic controllers might not be able to cope if, due to bad weather or a closed a runway, they were faced with multiple planes trying to land with minimum fuel levels on board.

The official report into the Ryanair Flight RY9ZC on-route from Stansted to Alicante in Spain with 170 passengers on board in May 2010 reveals regulators’ concerns about the policy. It details how the 27-year-old Ryanair captain decided not to take on any additional fuel other than that calculated in his flight plan.

In fact, due to better than expected weather conditions and a lower than estimated take-off weight, the plane’s fuel consumption was 477kg less than had been predicted. But as the plane approached the airport it faced unexpectedly strong winds and was forced abandon two attempts to land.

At that point the captain, and his 22-year-old co-pilot, made a decision to divert to Valencia. But while approaching the airport, the crew had to declare a Mayday.

The plane landed safely but a measurement of fuel after landing showed it had just 956kg remaining, 183kg below the final fuel reserve of 1,139kg required as part of its total fuel on take off. If the plane had had predicted conditions on route it would have had only 15 minutes of flying time.

In its analysis of the incident, the Spanish Civil Aviation Accident and Incident Investigation Commission said it was concerned that if more airlines adopted Ryanair’s fuel strategy then safety could be compromised.

The report concluded that the cause of the incident was the crew’s “inadequate decision-making process”.

Ryanair, the World’s Most Hated Airline, suffered a cabin depressurization on Flight FR2011 (Madrid-Gran Canaria) this week forcing the flight to make an emergency landing at Barajas airport shortly after takeoff.

The pilots carried out emergency procedures, oxygen masks were deployed and they began a controlled descent of the aircraft to the appropriate height.

The plane returned to Madrid “immediately” and landed normally at 8.25 hours disembarking passengers “safely”.

After the incident, sixteen passengers were treated by medical services.vFourteen of them were discharged and two were taken to a hospital but were discharged hours later.

A jet flown by Ryanair, the World’s most hated airline, was involved in an emergency landing following a cabin pressure alert yesterday, according to the BBC.

The plane was diverted to Frankfurt in Germany; the German authorities said 10 other people suffered minor injuries.

Among the 134 passengers on board Wednesday’s flight from Bergamo, in Italy, were Nottingham couple Melvin and Jacqueline Frater.

Mrs Frater said many of those on board were afraid during the incident.

“You could see the whites of the eyes of the people next to you. People were panicking but they weren’t screaming or shouting,” she said.

“You overheard the captain saying ‘Mayday, mayday,’ and he was saying it rapidly as we were going down. I thought my number was up.”
‘Crying with pain’

Ryanair said the captain had identified a pressurisation warning and descended from 31,000 ft to 10,000ft as recommended.

Mr Frater, from Bakersfield, said: “I don’t know how long we were actually falling but you could tell it was rapidly because of the pressure in our ears.

“Then the children and babies started crying with the pain.”

The aircraft landed at 12:00 local time and passengers were later taken on to East Midlands Airport on another flight.

It has been reported that another Ryanair Boeing 737-800 suffered a decompression on 6 February while flying from Bergamo to Charleroi in Belgium.

In a statement Ryanair apologised to all the passengers affected by the diversion and delay on Wednesday.

The aircraft has been examined, but the German Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation said the full investigation could take up to a year.

A spokesman for the bureau said three people were taken to hospital for examination after the incident but were not seriously injured. Ten people received minor injuries but did not require hospital treatment.

An engine on an aircraft operated by Ryanair, the World’s most hated airline, has been shut down in mid-air during a flight from Ireland to Spain.

The Ryanair Boeing 737-800, registration number EI-DLV and operating as flight number FR-7152 from Dublin to Santander, was on it’s approach to Santander airport when the crew reported they needed to shut down an engine. The airplane continued into Santander and thankfully arrived in one piece.

A replacement Boeing 737-800 was dispatched to Santander in order to perform the return leg but this resulted in a delay of over 9 hours for the poor passengers waiting to board in Spain.

Passengers were not charged extra for the luxury of a replacement aircraft, as far as we know.

Mr O’Leary was not ingested into the engine and therefore this could not have been a contributing factor to the incident.

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The FAA have ordered airlines to perform an emergency inspection of some 600 Boeing 737 airplanes after vibrations caused by a broken tail flap mechanism forced the diversion of a flight operated by Ryanair, the World’s most hated airline.

The Ryanair flight using a Boeing 737-800, registration EI-DYI and performing flight FR-5407 from Eindhoven to Madrid with 146 passengers, was climbing out of Eindhoven having reached FL240 just northeast of Brussels, when the crew reported technical problems.

The Ryanair flightcrew diverted from the intended route and made an uneventful landing.

The FAA then received a report from Boeing detailing the failure of the aft attach lugs on the left elevator tab control mechanism, which resulted in severe elevator vibration.

Sandy Angers, a Seattle-based spokeswoman for Boeing Co., said the company identified the problem after the Ryanair incident when a flight crew noticed “excessive” vibration and was forced to divert.

“There is a safety concern,” she said. “When we become aware of these types of issues, we respond quickly.”

Angers said the order effects about 600 “next-generation Boeing 737s, including the -600, -700, -800, and -900 series.

Subsequent investigation revealed extensive damage to the elevator tab control system. Severe vibration in this attach point is suspected of allowing rapid wear of the joint, and resulted in failure of the attach lugs.

This condition, if not corrected, could “result in a loss of aircraft control and structural integrity” and could thus cause a crash.